Empowerment of Cross-Border E-Commerce Platforms for Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises: Evidence from China

ABSTRACT Purpose Although the important role of cross-border e-commerce platforms in supporting small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) has continuously attracted scholarly attention, existing research overlooks the perspective of value chain processes, which have become more crucial when facing a dual shock from resurgent protectionist policies and the COVID-19 pandemic. This paper deconstructs strategic flexibility from the perspective of value chain processes and further explores the mechanism of cross-border e-commerce platform empowerment on SME export performance. Methodology/approach A total of 425 SMEs participating in cross-border e-commerce platforms were used as the research sample for this empirical study, subsequently analyzing the multiple mediating effects. Findings The results show that strategic flexibility plays a partial mediating role between the empowerment of e-commerce platforms and SMEs’ export performance. Specifically, market flexibility shows a relatively weak significance unlike delivery flexibility, which shows the strongest significance. Originality/Value Following the overall perspective of the platform ecosystem, this study expands and integrates traditional empowerment theory and value chain theory into one analytical framework. It investigates the mechanism through which e-commerce platform empowerment influences a firm's export performance. Practical implications Managerial suggestions for collaborative innovation of cross-border e-commerce platforms and SMEs in China are proposed. SMEs should actively integrate into platforms according to their business characteristics, fully exploit the platform resources, and focus on improving their responsiveness to export markets.